Dr Angelica Attard

Clinical Psychologist and Somatic Life Coach

  • My Values

    “ I bring my full self, my compassion, and my sensitivity, to each therapy or coaching session with you. I love how even when connecting from different parts of the world, we embark on a close journey together. We gain insight into what you need, practice skills, and identify the resources already within you that will support you live authentically with greater fulfilment and ease. I am here to see you, to hear you, to understand your needs, to celebrate you, and to guide you to do the same for yourself.”

“Everything that you need is within you already. I am here to support you to awaken to this and to celebrate it with you”

— Angelica Attard

  • Who I work with?

    I work with the people who experience the following difficulties:

    Depression | Anxiety | Low self-esteem | Low self-confidence | Self-Criticism | Stress | Burnout | Organisational issues | Bereavement | Loss of meaning in life | Feeling stuck in life | Feeling disconnected with yourself and your values | Adjustment to life transitions (e.g. moving country)

    I also provide therapy and coaching in Maltese.

  • Therapeutic Models

    I take an integrative approach to therapy and I adapt therapy to your needs. As a somatic coach we work with the whole of you in therapy, including your thoughts, emotions and body. I offer models that are evidence based and in the NICE guidelines:

    • Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)

    • Compassion Focussed Therapy (CFT)

    • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

    • Mindfulness based therapies

    • Eye Movement Desensitisation Reprocessing (EMDR)

    • I also offer Somatic Life Coaching. Click here if you are interested in coaching.

My Experience

For over ten years now, I have embarked on a therapeutic journey with many people from all over the world and from different walks of life. It continues to be special for me to meet and get to know every one of my clients.

As a professional myself living in London, I have developed a special interest in working with high achieving and high striving professionals in the City of London who work in Financial, Legal, Media, Academic, and Consulting sectors. I have extensive experience offering therapy to individuals with difficulties related to organisational pressures, high expectations, stress, burnout, anxiety, depression, trauma, loss of meaning and purpose in life and difficulties in their relationships with themselves and others.

Over the years I have increasingly seen that transformational change and healing requires that we work with both our mind and body. We store a lot of distress in our body and by learning how to create safeness in our nervous system we can shift ourselves out of a state of fight, flight, and freeze. In turn this can bring about long lasting change to our beliefs about ourselves, others and the world.

In addition to supporting people to process past issues and repair painful emotional wounds, I am passionate about supporting people to discover, develop and embody internal resources, qualities and skills that so that they can move from where they are now to where they want to be. This has led me to expand my practice to offer coaching and I am now trained as a Somatic Life Coach too (click here if you are interested in coaching.)

During my time in the NHS I specialised in working in Early Intervention Services for people with psychosis and schizophrenia as well as supporting family members and carers in their caregiving roles. I chose to broaden my specialist focus to support mothers, fathers and carers with perinatal mental health problems such as postnatal anxiety, depression, loss of a child, and trauma during childbirth, and to help them develop strong bonds with their babies.

I also provide consultation and deliver supervision to trainee clinical psychologists and qualified psychologists. I have delivered a range of teaching and training to mental health teams and students on psychology university courses, and I also offer workshops staff teams in corporate organisations regarding good mental health and well-being.

  • Qualifications

    • Doctorate in Clinical Psychology at the University of Birmingham

    • ICF Accredited Diploma in Body Oriented Coaching at the Somatic School in London

    • EMDR Training Levels 1, 2 and 3 approved by EMDR International and EMDR Europe Associations

    • Masters in Applied Neuropsychology at the University of Nottingham

    • Bachelor in Psychology (Hons) at the University of Malta

  • Affiliations & Memberships

    • Registered Clinical Psychologist with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) Registration number: PYL32378

    • Chartered member of British Psychological Society (BPS)

    • British Psychological Society Association for Contextual Behavioural Science

    • EMDR Association UK & Ireland

    • International Coaching Federation

  • O'Driscoll C, Free K, Attard A, Carter P, Mason J, Shaikh M. (2019) Transitioning to age inclusive early intervention for psychosis. Early Intervention in Psychiatry. 2019;1–7. https://doi.org/10.1111/eip.12905

    Attard A, Larkin M, Boden, Z, Jackson, C. (2017) Understanding adaptation to first episode psychosis through the creation of images. Journal of Psychosocial Rehabilitation and Mental Health, 4, 73–88 [Open Access]

    Attard A, & Larkin M. (2016). Art therapy for people with psychosis: a narrative review of the literature. Lancet Psychiatry 3, 1067-1078. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S2215-0366(16)30146-8

    Attard, A. & Coulson, N. S. (2012). A thematic analysis of patient communication in Parkinson’s disease online support group discussion forums. Computers in Human Behavior; 28, 500–506. doi:10.1016/j.chb.2011.10.022

    Mankiewicz P D, Reid J, Hughes E A, & Attard A (2021). Management of demographic equality of access to family intervention for psychosis in specialist community mental healthcare teams. British Journal of Healthcare Management; 27. https://doi.org/10.12968/bjhc.2020.0136

    B.Psy (Hons) dissertation entitled: 'The shaking palsy: Living with Parkinson’s disease' was presented as a poster for the 7th Malta Medical School Conference and published in the Malta Medical Journal in issue MMJ 21 (2009); 99:68-127. http://www.um.edu.mt/umms/mmj/showpdf.php?article=264